Jazz

Don Cherry Mu (The Complete Session) [Jazz][mp3 320][h33t][schon55]

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Don Cherry - Mu (The Complete Session)
Year: 1969
Label: Affinity
Total time: 68:52
Bitrate: 320 kbps

This classic pair of recordings, reissued as a single CD, captures Don Cherry near the height of his global quest to absorb as much music as possible from different cultures and funnel it back through his jazz sensibility. It's one of the earliest, and most successful, experiments in what would later come to be known as world music. He wisely chose his fellow Ornette Coleman cohort Ed Blackwell -- a drummer steeped in the traditions of New Orleans, African music, and free jazz -- for his partner. Despite his reputation as a trumpeter, Cherry spends a great deal of time here on piano, flutes, and vocals. His piano playing, while relatively simple, is fluid and melodic, owing a good deal to Abdullah Ibrahim (who is represented here with a couple of his themes). Likewise, his singing -- heavily influenced by Indian karnatic song -- is endearingly bright, heartfelt, and lovely. But, above all, his trumpet playing is stellar. When Cherry hits his ringing, clarion passages, he projects a purity of sound that few other trumpeters could match. Blackwell matches him sound for sound, with rolling West African-derived rhythms, Basin Street marches, and the most overtly musical tone of any drummer this side of Max Roach. The Mu sessions have long held legendary status and it's not difficult to hear why. Highly recommended. - by Brian Olewnick, AMG

Don Cherry, after leaving Ornette Coleman's group to travel through Europe, began to radically expand the boundaries of jazz, by importing elements of the musical traditions of various cultures -- from Chinese traditional music to Turkish folk music to Native Americana. This movement arguably begins with these sessions, which seem driven by a need to strip the impulse to play music down to something ancient, primal, and common to ALL traditions. Hence the reference to the lost continent of Mu, maybe -- an ancient origin point, a place of dispersal. MU was initially released on the rare BYG/Actuel imprint, on two separate LPs - with wonderful art by Cherry's wife Moki -- and subsequently rereleased on Affinity. The albums were recorded in one session, if I recall, in 1969; Cherry is accompanied by Ed Blackwell, on drums and varied percussion. Cherry isn't quite 'round to using gamelans, Tibetan chant, and so forth at this phase -- it's still pretty jazzy, really -- but there's a definite neoprimitivism afoot here, and there's a marked change of course from anything Cherry had done previously with Coleman, or really, from what anyone in jazz was doing at this point (I mean, yeah, people were going back to African influences -- but Cherry seemed interested in the music of the whole world). In addition to the pocket trumpet, Cherry sings, does handclaps, plays piano, flute, and no doubt joins Blackwell on percussion occasionally. The session is intimate, passionate, playful, intellectually exciting, and quite joyful at times, though it's probably only for, um, "serious" jazz listeners. Alas, Cherry's work throughout the late '60s and '70s remains vastly underappreciated, even after his death in 1995 -- which is baffling to me, given how wonderful some of his stuff is. MU is a highpoint of his career -- if anyone wants to take MY word for it. ~ Allan MacInnis

Personnel:
Don Cherry (Pocket Trumpet, Piano, Indian Flute, Bamboo Flute, Bells and Percussion)
Eb Blackwell (Drums and Percussion, Bells)

Don Cherry - Mu (The Complete Session) Tracks:
01 Brilliant Action/Amejelo/ Total Vibration/ Sun Of The East/ Terrestrial Being 38:09
02 The Mysticism Of My Sound/ Medley/Bamboo Night 13:32
03 Teo-Teo Can/ Smiling Faces/ Going Places/ Psycho Drama/ Medely 17:10
All compositions by Don Cherry

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